Fox TV sinks to new low

Update Nov. 21 - After public outcry, Rupert Murdoch announced the television interviews with OJ Simpson will not air and the book will not be released.

As a strong advocate of a free press, reluctantly I must defend Judith Regan's right to produce an inane television show featuring O.J. Simpson's "hypothetical" take on committing murder. But the lack of scruples involved in such a tasteless exercise, blatantly pandering to sensationalism, rather than news? That is indefensible.

Unfortunately that's the kind of crass behaviour I have come to expect from Rupert Murdoch's low-brow Fox channel and Fox "news." They'll make money on advertising - although it will be interesting to note what companies are stupid enough to have their names associated with this desperate bid for ratings in American television's "sweeps" period.

As for Simpson, whether or not he is guilty of the murders in 1994 - and a civil court said he was guilty, ordering him to pay restitution to families of the victims - what kind of father would expose his children to more painful memories of their mother's murder? And to "hypothetically" discuss how he would have done it? Shameful. Here's the sordid story via Media Bistro:

"O.J. Simpson: If I Did It, Here's How It Happened," will be released on November 30, accompanied by a two-part TV special where Judith Regan interviews Simpson on Fox TV, airing on November 27 and 29 - in other words, just in time for the end of sweeps week. The hook? Both book and special will depict Simpson describing "how he would have carried out the murders he has vehemently denied committing for over a decade." Which means there's now a two-week window to debate the tastelessness of such a move and wonder who would actually ante up the cash to advertise products while O.J. blathers on about how he would, ah, "hypothetically murder" his victims even though the "real killers" are still out on the golf course, or whatever the going excuse is of the moment.

The Washington Post's Lisa de Moraes has more on the story, including a statement from Nicole Brown's sister, Denise Brown: "We hope Ms. Regan takes full accountability for promoting the wrong doing of criminals and leveraging this forum and the actions of 'Simpson' to commercialize abuse." But Hollywood cynics aren't exactly holding their breath. "No, not in Hollywood at all, because we're all whores, but in the rest of the country where they have morals -- sure," guessed one such exec, who conceded that the moral, non-Hollywood segment of the country probably would nonetheless tune in by the millions.

Meanwhile the New York Times reports that it is unclear how much, if any, of the royalties from the book will go to the victims’ families. A Regan representative and a spokeswoman for Fox declined to comment beyond the news release.

Comments

[Giggles]

Repulsed and disheartened! Poor children saddled with such a despicable father!

[AscenderRisesAbove]

leave it to Fox; wondering how many people stopped watching that channel years ago...

[Marilyn]

Everything I've seen and read says that NONE of the money will go to the victims' families. But the kids! That was the first thing I thought of...as unimaginable as this horrific book/show thing is, all I could think was WHAT is he telling his kids?? If they had any doubts about his guilt before, surely they must not have any now.

[annieelf]

I feel a boycott of products coming on accompanied by letters of explanation to those companies. This is really revolting. Those poor kids.

[Amber]

That is the first thing I thought, "what kind of father would put his kid through this crap?"...Oh, yeah. One who would butcher their mom.

Anyone involved in this is wracking up the bad mojo.

:)

[tinker]

While I believe in a free press as well, I do wonder what's happened to good taste or even good sense...unforunately, I don't know if either of them matter much to producers nowadays, as long as the Nielsen ratings stay high.

My heart goes out to those children, and the other family members as well.

[Colette]

I was Fox to take off that "Fair and Balance" tag line they sport. It is such a big lie.

I wouldn't be surprised if Murdoch was behind that crass idea of Simpson writing that book. My first thought, too, was "what about his children?" I seriously question the man's sanity.

Since I had no axe to grind, I closely followed the trials back when. Frankly, the prosecution's case was a mess; there was reasonable doubt and some crucial issues were never explained, and had I been on that jury, I would have wanted explanations. I understand the families need someone to blame, but I really dislike people who decide "he/she did it" when they weren't there and there are holes in the story.

[Footpad]

Rupert Murdoch's pet PR machine is clearly taking pages from the book of William Randolph Hearst. Welcome to the new age of yellow journalism.

What's worse (to me), though, is that Fox News is the most popular of the "major" network news sources in this country.

Not to worry, though, some of us get our hard news from reliable and honest news sources, e.g. the BBC and NPR.

God save the Fourth Estate.

-- f

[Lisa(oceandreamer)]

I cannot for the life of me even imagine anyone contemplating this as anything more than a sick and twisted way to earn a buck. Any companies attaching themselves to this in the form of advertising should, in fact, be boycotted. Whoring for the almighty dollar has sunk to a new low.

[JanePoe (aka Deborah)]

Yes, I agree with free press ... but I also have the freedom to avoid this hideousness like the plague. Arrggghhhh.

[January]

This is the stupidest idea I've heard in a long time. Does anyone care anymore? I mean really, for O.J., it smells of desperation and a way to revise history. For FOX, it's all about the almighty dollar.

[The Bold Soul]

I'm acquainted with Nicole Brown's youngest sister although I never met Nicole or the rest of the family. I can only imagine what a nightmare this kind of thing is for their family and Ron Goldman's family. It's like it (he; OJ) just never goes away. He's the very definition of "sociopath", where it's always all about him and he cares nothing for anyone else. And it doesn't speak well of our culture which continues to give him the attention he craves.

[Judy]

Oh Lord...of course I meant to type Citizen Kane as the title of the film, but having the wonderful adventure of learning dutch and consequently dutch erasing all the english files in my brain, it appears - I now get my C's and K's totally twisted around..
LOL

What will she do with her brain? Tune into Fox News to find out...lol

Judy in Holland

[Kerstin]

This is where the law should be changed to allow a retrial for OJS, I am assuming this is not possible in the US? In the UK they scrapped the "double jeopardy" law last year, which had existed for some 800 years and prevented cases from being re-opened in the face of new evidence. Not any longer.

As for the promotion of this book that goes beyond tasteless. But sadly it reflects the state of our society, ever hungry for mindless and vulgar fodder.

[Judy]

Saw a blurb about this yesterday or so...

What can I say? Sadly, it doesn't surprise me in the least coming from Fox and that scum O.J. ... or the author, when I think about it. I can know some "expletive deletives" to describe them ... in 4 languages even! HA! It just prooves that people will jump to make money no matter how sordid and low brow it gets.

Freedom of the press???? ... yeah I suppose so, but this is more like "fill my pockets with gold, so I can play more golf" at work here - because people WILL tune in, you know they will. I've just had the "umpteenth time" true pleasure of watching "Citizen Cane"(glorious movie that one), because my Dutch husband had never seen the film (btw, he thought it was superb! :o) ). Trash news always sells and that's what this Fox thing is, just like "in the movies"... tra la!

Regarding the title of your post:
I'm sure Fox can think of new lows after this one. You can bank on that. And I'll get to tell my silly Dutch step-son that not all Americans think or act like what he sees/or reads from Fox news... oh happy day for me! :-(

I feel incredibly sorry for the families of Nicole & Ron that they will be put through this horror again and, as you surmised, probably at no recompense at all...just more torture for them.

Bottom line: This is pathetic, putrid journalism - if you can call it journalism, I wouldn't give it such an honour.

Tot ziens!
Judy
and the "kats" from Holland.

[ally bean]

I'm glad that you posted about this because you've said what my fuzzy brain was trying to put together. This creeps me out on so many levels that I can barely believe such a show will exist.

Wrong is wrong. And this would be very wrong.

[Laura]

Isn't this just unbelievable?? What next? I hope there's a huge backlash in some form or another.

[ainelivia]

I'm so gob smacked, I can't think of anything to say, except perhaps one could boycott the companies who do advertise.